Q&A: The Evolving Role Pharmacists Play in Team-Based Diabetes Care | ADA 2025

While many experts may argue that the role of pharmacists in health care is expanding in real time, there are still several barriers to pharmacists being realized as contributors to a fully integrated care team. However, there are promising opportunities for pharmacists to stand out within diabetes management due to their expertise and knowledge of the disease state.

“We're having physicians asking for help, and pharmacists are ideally positioned to be able to take that next step in helping to combat medication therapy problems with this disease but also to drive engagement with diabetes and helping patients understand more holistically what's going on with their diseases,” Jon Easter, RPh, associate faculty director at the University of North Carolina Center for the Business of Health, told Drug Topics.

Following his presentation at the American Diabetes Association’s 85th Scientific Sessions, titled “Adding Pharmacists to the Team—Enhancing Access and Patient Engagement for Better Outcomes,” he sat down with Drug Topics to discuss trends in pharmacists’ roles surrounding diabetes management. He also mentioned their barriers to expansion and the changes needed to be made in order to facilitate that expansion.

Easter went into depth about the various barriers that are slowly being broken down within diabetes management, allowing for pharmacists to shine within an interprofessional care team. | image credit: M+Isolation+Photo / stock.adobe.com

READ MORE: Physicians Looking to Pharmacists for Patient Engagement in Diabetes Management | ADA 2025

Drug Topics: Can you start by explaining how the pharmacist’s role in diabetes management has evolved in recent history, and where it is headed in the near future?

Jon Easter: It was a pleasure to be able to talk with a team of physicians at the ADA conference about team-based care and really reiterated for them the important role that pharmacists play in diabetes management. Coming from UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy, we know that pharmacists are trained at the top of their license in diabetes management, and we can see the growth of pharmacists engaged here, not only with academic centers where you have clinic settings where pharmacists are embedded there. Many, many pharmacists in the community setting are getting involved as certified diabetes educators. They're getting involved as DPP program, Diabetes Prevention Program, and actually getting reimbursed and paid for these programs.

I'm watching, and we're all watching, to see the expansion of pharmacist engagement around diabetes management because the medications are so complex and because the disease is so complex. We're having physicians asking for help, and pharmacists are ideally positioned to be able to take that next step in helping to combat medication therapy problems with this disease but also to drive engagement with diabetes and helping patients understand more holistically what's going on with their diseases.

There are accessibility opportunities with pharmacy in the community settings. They might have otherwise difficult time seeing an endocrinologist or primary care all the time but combining that medication expertise with physician communication and patient engagement; that's really why we're seeing the growth of diabetes management and pharmacist engagement there.

Drug Topics: What are the most significant barriers currently preventing pharmacists from being fully integrated into the health care team, and how can these be overcome?

Jon Easter: The barriers for team-based care and adding pharmacists to the team, I think it starts with reimbursement. Pharmacists have traditionally been reimbursed for the dispensing of medications, and we all know that. That has worked well for a while to be able to offer services while also being paid to dispense product. We know that the challenges that now sort of lead down the path of reimbursement and dispensing of medications have really pushed us to a place where reimbursement for services are super important.

I think there are plenty of opportunities to be able to ramp up physician-pharmacist collaboration, interdisciplinary practice, as we think about rural areas, as we think about the community setting. Those are growth opportunities there. Traditionally, physicians don't understand what pharmacists can bring to the table beyond a dispensing function. That educational process, those protocols, being able to put collaborative practice agreements in place, I think are all barriers that we could overcome from [those] cultural differences in bringing primary care physicians and pharmacists together as they begin to train together in the community setting, and then practice together, and then teach them how to develop these collaborative practice agreements and other things.

I think the last thing in terms of barriers and opportunities really is connectivity. If you have physicians and providers who understand the value of the pharmacist, they're building collaborative practice agreements or other contracts to be able to work together to facilitate diabetes care. Then, they need to figure out how best to connect with one another. Access to EHRs, bi-directional, read-write access, those types of things are really important, and we're seeing positive trends in that direction.

Read more from our coverage of the ADA’s 85th Scientific Sessions.

Are you ready to elevate your pharmacy practice? Sign up today for our free Drug Topics newsletter and get the latest drug information, industry trends, and patient care tips, straight to your inbox.